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The one piece of advice you wish you knew starting out

by Iteration
26 replies
I am hoping that as a community we can make a very focused thread with one central idea.

Now that you have gained experience in a few different areas of your business what is the one piece of advice you wish you knew when starting out and can you give a practical example of how you have implemented this advice yourself in your business?



I don't want to restrict the conversation but when people start listing 6 random vague things with no examples the thread goes off the rails quickly so if we could stick with your one single best piece of advice that would be great. No doubt someone else will cover the other points that you want to make and you will get to see how they implemented that.

As always, a practical example lets us understand better what your advice is and how it can be used in a real world example.

Thanks folks.
#advice #knew #piece #starting
  • Profile picture of the author salegurus
    Already answered a couple of times... Have a look at these:

    http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...-ever-had.html

    http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...-ever-got.html

    http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...-received.html
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  • Profile picture of the author erob
    I think the best advice that I first heard and did not understand is that " The Money is in the List". I look at the business model now and I kick my self for all the years that I never really took it serious. I built list in the past but never focused on it as much as I have over the last few months. Every real business keeps track of their customers in one way or another.

    Look at Amazon every time I visit the site and look for an item and don't buy, you can bet Amazon will email me a reminder or something similar to what I was looking at on the site. As Internet Marketers we must take in what Big Business is doing and incorporate it into our own business as well.
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    • Profile picture of the author Iteration
      Absolutely erob.

      What changes have you made over the last few months to encourage people to sign up to your email list or for subscribers to engage more with your emails?

      Do you use a free email list service from your hosting provider or have you splashed the cash on a premium email list service like Mail Chimp?
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      • Profile picture of the author Iteration
        Durell what specific changes have you made to your content?

        What kind of business model do you operate?
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      • Profile picture of the author Steve B
        Al's advice about using the search function is actually very good.

        In all the year's I've been frequenting this forum, I see that new and hopeful business owners typically ask the same questions when starting out.

        If you have a particular topic that you need to address, the very first place to start is with the archives here at the WF. There really is a wealth of information contained there. Yes, you might have to dig a little . . . but in all honesty, "digging" helps to add to your education and teaches you how to solve problems and do research which are skills every good business person should learn.

        It was Sir Isaac Newton in a 1676 letter that said:

        "If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants."

        The application here, of course, is that discovering the truth about Internet marketing is best done by building upon the truths already discovered by others. You find those truths by using the search function.

        The best to all of you,

        Steve

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  • Profile picture of the author Durell217
    A tip I wish I was given at the very beginning is about providing high quality content. Content marketing is on the high rise right now because just showing ads on TV doesn't work as well anymore. The people want and deserve more than that in addition to the fact that people have become desensitized to the ads so they just ignore them. In the beginning I didn't know about this and did things in a robotic fashion that didn't really connect with the user. Over time I learned about how to create high quality content for the user by asking questions like "would I be interested in my own services when reading this?". High quality content is definitely the way to go now. I just wished I known about it sooner.
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  • Profile picture of the author Iteration
    Never undervalue yourself!

    Its much easier to decrease your price or give some added value than it is to increase your price!

    There are excel templates available where you can figure out how much to charge for your hourly rate when providing a service to achieve your target level of income.

    A good one will factor in all aspects such as travel, training, holidays, marketing spend, overheads, sick days, ect
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  • Profile picture of the author dndoseller
    I would have focused more on building my email list over SEO and social.

    The Google positions and social accounts I have could be taken away at any moment even after 8 years. So my one big "successful" site is always at risk.
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  • Profile picture of the author DWaters
    I do not think I would have spent much time with SEO but I would have working more on list building. I also would have started my FBA business on Day ONE!
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  • Profile picture of the author MichaelAppleton
    Build a list, although I knew it I didn't listen and I would bet this is the same for a lot marketers.
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  • Profile picture of the author Randall Magwood
    Originally Posted by Iteration View Post

    The one piece of advice you wish you knew starting out.
    10,000 opt-in email subscribers isn't really alot of people.
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    • Profile picture of the author MikeVietri
      The biggest piece of advice I have ever received is that I must build an audience of followers by establishing my name and brand as trust worthy and authoritative, and building an email is a huge part of that as it is the most intimate way for you to connect with people who want to hear what you have to say and offer.

      People buy form people, and our jobs as marketers should be to provide value to those with the problems. When you can make helping people your primary intention when ever your are doing your marketing, than it will be natural for people to begin seeing you as trust worthy and the second that happens, they put down their guard and then they can listen to what you have to say.

      I think the biggest mistake most newbie marketers make, is that they get too caught up in the "money" aspect of this business, they forget that they are communicating with real people who are searching for real solutions to their problems. They focus on "making money" rather than on being helpful,

      Simply being helpful in anyway you can, will allow you to build an audience of real followers who want to consume your content and will trust your recommendations. Meaning money in your bank account.

      You can make millions form your online business, that is true. But I believe the real beauty of Internet Marketing is that the only way to get there, is through being truly helpful to others. Once you can master relationship building, and can provide massive value to real people than their is no limit to how much money that individual is willing to spend with you, as long as your value is worth it.

      Hoped that helped!

      Mike Vietri.
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      • Profile picture of the author Peter Lee
        It would be.....focus on just one thing that makes you the most income....then grow your business
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        • Profile picture of the author Jon Crimes
          Mine would be 'focus' as well!

          So many shiny objects, how much money I have spent over the years and how much time reading info products, a lot of them not very good but then it's too late by the time you've got to the end of the drivel.

          Not any more...but I wish I had taken notice of this advice 5 years ago .

          Cheers
          Jon
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          • Profile picture of the author Iteration
            A lot of people make the mistake that they get good at something and then focus a lot of time on improving something they are not good at. In the vast majority of cases this is a mistake. Focus on the things you are really good at and excel at them - outsource the things you are not good at. Fiverr.com is a great resource and I have had a lot of projects done there and the quality of the work in most cases is top quality for a fraction of the cost of hiring someone in your own city who has to factor in a lot of overheads into their quote.

            Time management is the thing that results in a lot of people failing quickly at business. They are working long hours and telling people how hard they are working but they are not working efficiently or effectively. At the start do 2 things. Decide WHY you are doing what you are doing. Make To-Do lists but have timeframes for each activity and break each task into smaller tasks - for example don't simply have 'Write new article for website', instead have 'Write 3 paragraphs for an article, one hour per paragraph, paragraph 1 focus point, paragraph 2 focus point, ect'. Also, your morning hours will be your most productive even if you think you are a night owl so don't waste them checking email, use them for projects that require a lot of mental attention and that are tasks that you might not particularly like doing.
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  • Profile picture of the author ChrisBa
    Originally Posted by Iteration View Post

    I am hoping that as a community we can make a very focused thread with one central idea.

    Now that you have gained experience in a few different areas of your business what is the one piece of advice you wish you knew when starting out and can you give a practical example of how you have implemented this advice yourself in your business?



    I don't want to restrict the conversation but when people start listing 6 random vague things with no examples the thread goes off the rails quickly so if we could stick with your one single best piece of advice that would be great. No doubt someone else will cover the other points that you want to make and you will get to see how they implemented that.

    As always, a practical example lets us understand better what your advice is and how it can be used in a real world example.

    Thanks folks.
    To jump in, I spent too much time going back and forth and over thinking everything. My biggest piece of advice would be to start jumping in and doing, you learn so much more doing that than reading about it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jason Kanigan
    Stop worrying about "will it work" and commit to making something work no matter what.

    If other people have succeeded with it, you can, too.

    They had to figure it out.

    The Map Is Not The Territory.
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    • Profile picture of the author Rory Singh
      Originally Posted by Jason Kanigan View Post

      Stop worrying about "will it work" and commit to making something work no matter what.
      That's probably the best advice you will get.

      This is what it means to have the 'right mindset' for success.

      Everyone is too focused on what works or what's the best short cut for success.

      In truth, there are no short cuts. There are systems, tools and courses that will help you but no short cuts...you will have to pay the price for success just like the rest of us.

      Get started and figure it out. End of story.
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  • Profile picture of the author Kalambur
    what is the one piece of advice you wish you knew when starting out and can you give a practical example of how you have implemented this advice yourself in your business?
    I wish, I understood the importance of self-discipline and goals settings. Now I'm reading a lot of books on motivation, psychology by Brian Tracy, Tony Robbins. I wish I read something like that when I was a schoolboy.

    It might sound a little bit weird, but I wish I knew that if you want to be a successful moneymaker, you have to drink fresh juices, get up earlier in the morning, write a plan for the next day before you go to bed and so on.
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    • Profile picture of the author MValmont
      To have confidence and really go ALL IN.

      That's probably one of the biggest mistakes I see beginners making...Hell, some people even approached me to review some product that I launched because they wanted to review it, then when I ask them their e-mail to send them the product, some of them would say : I'm not sure it will work so I would prefer not to....I offered them the product for FREE and they would STILL not take action.

      It's all about the mindset. So many people have negative beliefs about internet marketing and business in general and this is way they don't succeed. When I started I was hesitant also, but I attended a Tony Robins seminar (Unleash the power within) and since that time i'm really all in and things go great.
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  • Profile picture of the author chris361
    Hello everyone,

    I am trying to set up an information based product around airline recruitment for one of the airlines in Europe. The recruitment process is incredibly popular and seems to be a natural are for interest.

    I am struggling to work out what the best way of building a product for this market however,

    Im calling on your experience and expertise in this area, how would you best attack this.

    Thank you in advance
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  • Profile picture of the author Willie Crawford
    My focus has always been on list-building and traffic, but if I did it all over again, I would focus on making my list-building more segmented.

    I would set up on whatever autoresponder system so that I could better tell the age, sex, income, education level, and interest of each subscriber rather than just focusing on building huge lists.

    Most autoresponder systems that I've looked at lately allow you to automatically remove people from one list and add them to another when they take a specific action such as making a purchase, taking a survey, etc.

    By better segmenting, which I have started focusing on, you don't annoy your list members who aren't interested in a specific topic.

    Another advantage of doing that is that you can promote more different products and services with better results. Internet marketers are notorious for saying yes when asked to promote something that looks promising... and we tend to say yes to too many different things. With better list segmentation, you can actually promote ONLY those specific things that members of a given list have shown interest in, which "should" increase your conversions dramatically.

    I'm still doing a lot of testing and tracking, so may come back and share some of my stats on the difference that better segmentation made.

    Willie
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    • Profile picture of the author The Niche Man
      Make the best use of Google!

      • Make the best use of Google ... To check the background, track record and history (success leaves clues) of people who make claims and brag about themselves in sales letters and ads.
      • Make the best use of Google ... Because often the information I paid for was already available on Google or Youtube for Free - and in most cases gave me better results.
      • Make the best use of Google ... To the get the facts to a lot of questions I had instead of asking others who gave me their knee-jerk hunches, guesstimates or opinions. (See 90% of W.F posts).

      To this day it still amazes me how little people use this free tool or "9th Wonder of The World" (in my opinion) called Google. SMH.
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  • Profile picture of the author PassiveIncomes
    Focus, focus and FOCUS. This is what I missed out. I started IM on keep looking on shiny things.
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  • Profile picture of the author arrival7
    Best advice I wish someone would have told me, would be to find a business that doesn't seem like WORK! Even if the money is good, the work life gets boring and unfulfilled. Find passion my friend, or at least find something that fits your nature.
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  • Profile picture of the author Joe Benjamin
    Best piece of advice I wish I got?

    Stay out the forums and build a
    business.

    - Josef
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